Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi is the first Chief Minister in the country to have been questioned on a criminal complaint

CM Narendra Modi on 27 March 2010 after getting interrogated by SIT

It is the first time in Indian history that a sitting Chief Minister has been accused and interrogated for a crime such as mass murder. The “will he won’t he” suspense eventually ended on March 27 when Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi presented himself before the Special Investigation Team (SIT) to be interrogated for his alleged complicity in the 2002 riots. Modi is the first Chief Minister in the country to have been questioned on a criminal complaint.

Close to 1,500 people lost their lives in the days of rioting that followed the burning of a coach of the Sabarmati Express at Godhra, in which 59 kar sevaks returning from Ayodhya died. The investigation into the Godhra

incident and the Gujarat riots has been going on for eight years.

For a man who holds such a high office and, more importantly, is known for his power and control, this was a humbling experience. He is accused of aiding and abetting riots in Gulberg Society, a residential colony in Ahmedabad, where 68 people were killed in a mob attack on February 28, 2002. Modi has been indicted in a petition filed by Zakia Jafri, whose husband Ehsan Jafri, a former Congress Member of Parliament, was killed in the attack on Gulberg Society. Zakia Jafri has accused Modi and 62 others of instructing officials not to heed cries for help by Muslims during the riots. She says her husband made frantic calls to Modi and several police officers and politicians, but no one came to their aid. She believes that the attack on Gulberg Society was a planned one and that her husband was targeted.

Zakia Jafri